


Radiophonic Stranger 1

by Iksian



Category: None - Fandom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-02
Updated: 2020-06-02
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:01:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 935
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24502027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iksian/pseuds/Iksian
Summary: For a roleplay: Prequel to events.





	Radiophonic Stranger 1

Life moves awful fast. Gets faster the older you get. What seems like days turns to months and then into years. You try your best to pull on the brakes. Slow down they say, smell the flowers! Put in some vacation hours and sit around the sun sipping margaritas and flirting with the bartender named some variation of Steve. You have to be static to slow things down to a crawl. Or working some normal nine to five schlock downtown in a barely air-conditioned office.

Time never really slowed down for me. Things just happened. Promises were made. And before you know it the ones I made the promises to just...passed on. People pass on in more ways than one. Either because you piss them off, they piss you off, or the heart just breaks in ways that make you just act out. I never really did figure out how to lose gracefully. Never figured out how not to be that crazy aftermath.

Lycera found me one night on one of my longer walks. The kind of walks that hurt your knees and never really help figure things out. Like suddenly changing the locale is going to inspire some unseen truth. She asked me what my problem was. Of course, I don't want to tell her. No weakness. Corporate wouldn't like that. I shy away, makeup something. Bile comes out of my mouth on instinct. Hurtful words. Of course, Lycera isn't the type to put up with that. Nor is she the type to believe it. When the walls come tumbling down I feel exposed. 

I mention the promise.

A while back after the second great war my friend Felix Rothschild and I have moved on. We're slowing down, smelling those flowers. Those flowers happen to be shots of unholy whiskey in the local sin-den for us under dwellers. Felix lost a lot of his family during the war. Loved ones who put their lives on the line trying to save others who were in deep shit. Eventually, I pull some strings for him, help his granddaughter Idoline hop a boat over to the States. She had it hard at first but eventually found a gig singing for us undead shmucks. Warmed our cold dead hearts hearing her sing-song voice while we sucked down giggle water and played poker. She didn't deserve the smokey shithole we'd made for ourselves. Felix said she deserved better. I did too. But it paid well and she was safe.

Or so we thought...

Jesus Christ. I don't know how much I could regret the decision to bring her down into that hole. I should've remembered the types that dumpster fire attracts. Sure we got guys from The Kingdom but...

It also attracted the wandering Strangers.

It was a transitional place. It used to be an old taxi driver service. We converted it into a bar. There was enough transitional energy to make any mortal uncomfortable being there for a few moments before the broken down genetics in their backward ass mind coaxed them away from that bar. Idoline was special. We found a way to help her cope. 

The Strangers never had such a problem with such transitional places. They were always in transit. So they felt right at home. 

They weren't all so intrusive. You'd see a shadowy figure on the wall. We'd place bets.

"Oi boys is this one a reflection or a visitor!?" 

We'd have a laugh. Sometimes they'd come through completely. Tightly bound entities in loose suits of skin pretending at being human for a drink and the latest otherworldly gossip. They'd trade in rumor and lore. Lips never moved in synch with the voices in our heads. The pretense of spoke speech was appreciated but got annoying fast. Like watching a movie with dubs.

The night he came was the worst.

It felt like he was trying to figure out color at first. The skin started hanging all wrong, sagging in parts it shouldn't sag. One of the boys, a revenant I think, took him into the bathroom to help sort out the sagging issue. But color... color was the worst. Garish colors that stuck out like a sore thumb. Color corrected skin shimmering and adjusting. Eventually, he found a skin tone. Wasn't an earthly one but we gave him credit for trying. He spoke like a busted radio. I assume he'd learned our language from radio waves bouncing through the cosmos. He'd slip in little advertisements into his speech.

He heard them so much, he assumed that's what we liked to hear...

The color corrected gent sat down and enjoyed a night with the boys. Singing, drinking, sinning, living. Smelling the flowers. He caught a whiff though. Something else lured him in. Queue Idoline Rothschild: My friend's darling Granddaughter. Voice of an angel. Fingers that played the piano like it had a trust fund she intended scam out of it. And apparently just this guy's type. 

The guy was a regular before you know it. Years. We got so used to him. And he got so used to being human. Guy liked to dress up. Guy liked celebrities. Faces, skins, fashion, it was all passive for him. Like shedding a persona and creating a new one. Permanence slid off of him like water off a duck's back. We recognized him just from the feeling alone. I'm no empath, but obsession itself carries with it a heaviness in the air. Feels like grease on your skin, smells like cheap aftershave and mold.

What happened next tore me up inside for years to come...


End file.
